


Dollars to Donuts

by flailingmuse



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Asexual Character, Asexuality, Fluff, Gen, M/M, ace!Tony, ace!loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-19
Updated: 2016-05-19
Packaged: 2018-06-09 11:36:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6904333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flailingmuse/pseuds/flailingmuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>University AU. Tony texts Loki offering money for Loki to be his personal takeout guy. It’s weird, but so is Tony, and Loki is strapped for cash. The arrangement becomes something more when Tony changes the script and asks him for something else – a favour.  </p>
<p>All human English University AU because that is all I know how to write. Ace!Tony, and Ace!Loki. AU fluff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dollars to Donuts

 

Loki was trying to work. The key word being 'try'. He'd been stuck on the stupid perspective of this stupid church for three stupid hours. Screwed up paper littered the floor, and there were eraser shavings all over his desk. He tapped his pencil against his teeth and stared at his hastily - but still impeccably put together - reference maquette. He frowned.

_bzzzz_

A sigh escaped his lips and he closed his eyes.

_bzz_

_bzz_

_bzz_

He reached over and unlocked his phone. Four new messages, all from the same person, the undisputed master of not only the double text, but the triple, quadruple and fucking multi-text.

_-Hey_

_-??_

_-You busy?_

_-Want $$$$??_

Loki tapped out a response, so hard that if his phone might have cracked if it hadn’t already been half-smashed.

_-Do I look like a fucking prostitute?_

Then slapped the phone back down again. He turned the maquette slightly - maybe a change in angle would make drawing the stupid thing some miniscule bit easier. He twisted it again, tapped his pencil against his teeth. His eyes drifted from the blank paper, across his mess of a room, the empty tubs of noodles piled in the bin, the pyramid of half-crushed, off-brand energy drinks from three separate all-nighters. Most distressing of all, the broken remains of his graphics tablet, bent almost in two. It lay next to the bin, its cable coiled pathetically on top of it, a few stray wires poking forlornly from the connector.

He picked up the phone.

_-How much?_

\-----

And that was how, thirty minutes later, he found himself standing in front of a disgustingly nice door, in a disgustingly nice part of town, holding two takeaway pizza's and a six pack of cider. He knocked with his foot.

"Coming! Coming! Hold on a minute!" there was the sound of something heavy falling over, then swearing, then running feet. The door was yanked open and Tony Stark grinned out at him.

"Hey, thanks for the favour," he took the boxes from Loki and strolled back into the house. The door having not immediately been slammed in his face, Loki followed him into the kitchen. With some effort he managed to keep the amazement off his face at the interior of the house. It hadn’t looked all that big from the outside, but insides…it was something else. To get to the kitchen they had to go through an immaculate, white tiled corridor, and past a living room carpeted in plush crimson with a sleek, black TV hanging on the wall, matching with the equally sleek black leather sofas.

The kitchen itself was a modern minimalist marvel. The counters were all black stone, the fixtures gleaming silver. The only thing not perfect about it was the pile of unwashed dishes stacked high by a sink so bright and clean there was no way it had ever been used. Interesting, given that Loki knew for a fact Tony had been here almost a year now.

Loki set the cider on the counter and leaned against it as casually as he could, swallowing down every comment about the house.

"You like the place?" Tony asked, already shovelling pizza into his mouth.

"Well I've...never actually been to your house before,” Loki deflected, examining his nails. He scratched at a smear of ink on his thumb.

"S'not mine," Tony came over and freed a can from the six pack. He opened it, gulping it down thirstily. Loki couldn't help wrinkling his nose at the smell.

"It belongs to my parents,” Tony continued, “But they're still State-side, so...." he shrugged. “I make it my own. Want some?" he waved vaguely at the pizza and offered out his can. Loki shook his head.

“Not really my thing. Thanks.”

"Suit yourself." Tony picked up the six pack, stacked it and the pizza boxes on top of each other and nudged open a door at the back of the kitchen. Beyond it was a set of stairs leading down, lit by bright white lamps in the walls. Now the door was open Loki could hear pounding music coming up from what was presumably some kind of basement. Tony called over his shoulder as he descended;

"There’s money on the counter for you! Thanks for the food – you’re a lifesaver!”

He disappeared down the rest of the stairs, leaving Loki alone in the kitchen. He sighed to himself, and looked around for the money. There was a plain envelope sat next to the toaster – he picked it up and peeked inside. His eyes widened and he shoved the envelope in his pocket and fled the house before Tony could reappear and change his mind.

Sweet mother of whatever deity was in the vicinity, he could eat real food again.

\---

If he was being entirely honest, animal anatomy could go suck ten thousand oversized whale dicks. Thirteen books, a handful of magazines, and so many tabs his poor laptop was about five minutes away from a total nervous breakdown and none of it had helped. Why couldn’t he have just stuck with humans? He at least knew how they worked – mostly – and he had ample reference right there in his room without having to lug his own bodyweight in reference material from the library.

But no. As always, ego had won out over practicality and here he was, trying to work out how in the hell ostrich anatomy worked. He had to solve the ostrich problem before he could move onto anything else, and it wasn’t like he could change the project now – that would be admitting defeat. And no great artist every got anywhere by capitulating to a bird that looked like some mutated feather duster on steroids.

He erased the few lines he’d half-heartedly laid down, and set his jaw. Now was the time to focus. No more excuses. This ostrich was about to become his bitch.

_bzzz_

Without taking his eyes off the paper, Loki reached over and switched his phone off. He did not have the time to be running errands – however lucrative – for Stark today. He had a week and a half to defeat this, and he barely knew what he was doing as it was.

_ding!_

_ding!_

_ding!_

Which tab was that even coming from? He clicked through them frantically, more notifications already coming through. Finally he found the rogue Facebook tab and opened the messages.

_-hey_

_-hey Loki_

_-Loki_

_-Looooookkkiiii_

_-want $$$????_

_-because i want donuts_

_-if you understand what im saying here_

_-are you there?_

_-im dying here literally dying_

_-Loooookkkkeeeess_

_-I swear I will literally pay your entire tuition or whatever will you just reply oh my god?!_

With some effort, Loki resisted the urge to shove his pencil through the screen – god knew he couldn’t afford to replace that – and tapped out a reply.

_-not now. I’m busy. Find someone else to run errands_

He was about to exit the tab when Tony replied.

_-but Loki i need donuts to live_

_-also I can’t actually leave my basement right now im kind of stuck please help??_

Loki rolled his eyes, though a seed of worry had started to grow in the back of his mind. He squashed it – Stark was just being over dramatic, as always. Even from the first time they’d met – accidentally, at a Fresher’s fair Loki hadn’t even wanted to go to – he had displayed his propensity for melodrama. It might have been endearing if it hadn’t been so irritating.

_-Why? Did you create your own personal atmosphere that you can't breathe outside of? Or did your lazy-itis finally lay you low?_

Tony pinged back in less than three seconds.

_-you’re an ass_

_-also_

_-i might have glued my hand to some metal_

_-i also might not have done that_

_-but its a strong possibility_

_-I can neither confirm nor deny the fact that there is some serious glue involved in this current predicament_

_-but also please help._

Loki stared at the screen, for a moment unable to come up with any response. All he could think of to say was;

_-how are you typing so fast then?_

There was a brief pause – long enough to give him cause for concern, given how fast Tony had been replying before – and then another string of messages came in. Loki had by now dropped his pencil entirely, the possibility of getting any work done now long since discarded. The ostriches could wait. He read over the messaged with a growing mixture of concern, annoyance and amusement.

_-look I am a very talented young man with a bright future_

_-and I can type just fine with one hand so fuck you ok_

_-besides I have predictive text so its not like its hard_

_-predictive text I modified myself I might add so its not totally awful like most of them are_

_-which you would know if you had any kind of decent PHONE YOU UNCULTURED LITTLE SHIT_

_-im sorry that was aggressive im just in a really bad place right now_

_-and that place is stuck to my own goddamn robot_

Loki rolled his eyes again, wishing Stark could see him, if only to see how pissed off he’d get at Loki’s expression.

_-you’re an arrogant idiot. But given your predicament, I will assist you. Try to survive for thirty more minutes._

Just before he closed the computer Tony messaged him one last time:

_-DONUTS! AND COFFEE!!!_

\-----

When he got there the front door was shut, but not locked. _Fortunate_ , he thought. Had Stark somehow known he was going to get himself stuck down in the basement and left it open for his inevitable rescuers? Loki doubted it. The idiot had probably just forgotten to lock it. He slipped into the house, feeling vaguely guilty about it, and called out into the silence;

"Stark? Are you still alive?” there was nothing but more silence. “Tony?”

“Down here!” Tony finally called back. Then he shouted an awful lot of curse words, and Loki followed the sound of them through the kitchen and down the stairs he’d seen the last time he’d been there. Once down in the basement, he soon found out just how badly Tony had screwed up this time.

He had been working on some new engineering project, the components of which were spread across the entirety of the basement workshop. Tony himself was in the middle of the room, sitting next to something that looked like the bottom half of a humanoid robot, with his hand firmly stuck to what Loki could only refer to as the robots ass. Wires and cables poked out and around the legs of whatever it was Tony was building, some of them connected to various boxes and batteries and other devices on the floor, others just wandering into the air.

The toes on the robot’s foot spasmed with a whine of gears. Tony jerked his stuck hand, got nowhere, and sighed. He did all this without looking up from the pone in his lap, which he was tapping away at quite furiously with his remaining free hand.

Loki leaned against the doorway, a smirk on his lips.

“Well, you’re not top of the class for nothing, are you Stark?” he said. Tony snapped his head up and glared at him.

“Dude. Just give me the donuts I know you bought because otherwise what is even the point of you, and help me unstick myself. There’s acetone literally on the table next to you.”

Loki picked up the bottle and walked over to hand it to him.

“Tell me you’re not putting this thing together with superglue and duct tape,” he said. Up close, the tangle of wires looked less like a mess and more like…well…muscle structure. It looked like he wasn’t the only one studying anatomy today.

“No, of course not,” Tony said, yanking his hand free with a wince. There was still glue on it, and parts of the skin had torn. Loki grimaced at the sight of it. “And look, there’s a good reason my hand was stuck to this things ass, okay, and I-“

Loki held up his hand.

“No. I don’t care. Please do not tell me why you were groping your own weirdly advanced robot.” He slid his bag off his shoulder and dropped the bag of donuts into Tony’s lap. “And you never said what kind of coffee you wanted, so I didn’t get you any. I did, however, get you these.”

Tony made a face at the grapes Loki tossed at him.

“What the hell is this?”

“A very likely far too late attempt to help you not die of heart disease before the age of thirty.”

Tony rolled his eyes, and bit into a donut. He sighed blissfully around the mouthful of jam and sugar.

“Now that’s the stuff,” he said with his mouth full. It was Loki’s turn to roll his eyes. He ignored Stark while he commenced stuffing his face, and took the opportunity to look around the room. Apart from the actually slightly concerning example of advanced robotics on the centre platform, there were other equally incredible projects all over the basement.

On one large metal worktable there was some kind of gauntlet, laying palm up with a tangle of wires coming out of the centre of it. On another there was something that looked like a modified fire alarm, hooked up to an enormous car battery and humming to itself. And around all of these projects lay more wires, pieces of circuitry and machinery that Loki didn’t have the faintest clue as to what they were. Batteries, screwdrivers, glue-guns, drills, wires, pieces of circuit-board – it was like he’d raided a DIY store, an electronics store, and some kind of black market robotics seller.

In addition to the impressive creations and astonishing mess, there were blueprints and schematics of every shape and size pinned to the wall. The drawings were messy enough that they had to have been drawn by Tony himself, but they were so complex that Loki had trouble believing it even so.

“Impressed yet? I know, it’s a lot to take in, but just, you know, let it sit,” Tony came up behind him, making him jump.  “Did you get any other kinds of donuts?”

Loki sighed.

“Did you eat any grapes?”

“If I say yes, do I get more donuts?”

Loki looked over his shoulder and saw the still unopened packet of fruit on the floor. He shook his head.

“No, I didn’t _get_ any more donuts. One packet should be enough for anyone. Anyone normal, that is.”

Tony grinned at him, and shoved his shoulder.

“C’mon, Loki – I’m so much better than normal.” He dug his wallet out of his pocket and thumbed through it, pulling out some notes. “Here. For the rescue, more than anything else.”

Loki didn’t dare to count it, just shoved it straight into his jeans pocket without looking. The last amount Tony had given him had covered the cost of the food and beer he’d gotten for him three times over – enough to feed Loki decent groceries for the next week and a half. If this was anything close to the last amount, Loki would be cooking properly for the rest of the month.

“So, what are you building down here?” he asked, before Stark could sense his distraction. Tony was immediately off and rambling. In between mouthfuls of the last donut he explained about circuitry and programming and servos and a whole host of engineering and robotics-related jargon that Loki didn’t understand a word of. But Tony seemed happy, so he let him go on talking.

"But, I should let you go, I guess," Tony finally finished up. "You, uh, you’ve probably got a lot of work to do."

"Yes," Loki said. He immediately felt tension flood his shoulders as he remembered just how much he had to get done. He grimaced.

"Well, uh, see you round? Maybe?" Tony rubbed the back of his head, making his already messy hair stick up even more. There was a smear of jam on his cheek and for a strange, unsettling moment, Loki fought down the unsettling urge to reach over and clean it off.

He managed half a smile.

"I'm sure you will. Don't glue yourself to anything else."

Tony flipped him off and Loki couldn't help a short laugh as he hurried up the stairs and out of the house.

\-----

_bzz_

_bzz_

- _$$$?_

- _subway??_

\-----

_bzz_

_bzz_

_-$$$?_

_-bring me five guys and i'll throw in a prototype of my gauntlet_

_\-----_

_bzz_

_bzz_

_bzz_

\-----

Loki was by now getting used to the fact that he had a part time job as Tony Stark’s personal takeout guy. The fact that Tony was both willing and able to so frequently drop so much cash on something he could have gotten far cheaper by just ordering it normally, or heaven forbid, _leaving the house to get it_ , was more than a little confusing. But as long as it kept Loki in groceries and an internet connection, he wasn’t going to question it. His student loan only went so far, and with the rent due to go up in less than two months, he needed all the help he could get.

It had gotten to the point where, no matter how busy he was, what deadline he had, or even what time of the day  (or very frequently night) it was, if his phone buzzed with a food request from Stark, Loki would fulfil it in record time. He certainly considered himself far superior in speed and service to your average delivery guy.

Not that he would ever have said such a thing out loud.

And if his flatmates were confused about where he kept rushing off to so frequently, none of them ever said anything about it. Well, that was fine, Loki thought. They’d all been shoved together by random chance anyway, and none of them were even a fraction as interesting as Tony was to talk to.

Still, he very rarely shared any of the food he brought for Tony. He’d stick around sometimes after delivering it, maybe listen to Stark rant at him about some portion of code he was stuck on, or a mechanism that wouldn’t work the way he _knew_ it should. Even Loki couldn’t deny how impressive Tony’s work was, and he of all people could appreciate talent.

It did confuse him, somewhat, why someone with Tony’s clear abilities was even bothering to get himself in debt to a university that wasn’t even in his home country, but Loki never asked. He figured that Stark had his reasons, and that was enough. Besides, so long as they kept up their strange relationship, then Loki was pretty sure that in maybe a month or so he’d be able to replace the dead graphics tablet and then most of his assignment-related stress would be solved.

He was good with other mediums, certainly – and the responses in his critiques reflected that, no doubt about it. And how he revelled in the sometimes awed, sometimes jealous, reactions he could get from some of his work. But with his tablet back he would once again be on a much higher level than the others again. If he was being modest about it, of course.

And besides, using a mouse or a trackpad all the time was starting to hurt his wrists.

\-----

_bzz_

_bzz_

_bzz_

Loki steadfastly ignored the little eager leap in his chest as he scrambled to pull his phone out of his pocket. Stark again, of course – it wasn’t as if there was anyone else who ever messaged him. His brother would have, but he’d blocked the number the moment he’d left home. The phone buzzed a few more times in his hand even as he opened the messages.

_-hey_

_-you free?_

_-$$$$_

_-and more on top_

_-for a pizza and a favour_

_-not a little favour either so serious $$$ for you if you want_

_-the pizza is compulsory the favour is not_

_-but you know whatever_

It was a little more rambling than Tony’s messages usually were. He probably hadn’t eaten for 48 hours again or something. Loki shoved his phone into his pocket, grabbed his jacket and headed out. Forty minutes later he was knocking at Tony’s door with two pizzas keeping his hands warm, and two litres of Dr Pepper making the handles of a carrier bag cut off the circulation in his wrist. Tony yanked the door open, looking more frazzled than usual – somewhat of an incredible feat, given his usual state of handsome dishevelment.

“Loki! I’m glad you’re here. Come in, come on, come on,” he ushered Loki inside and shoved the door closed. The second he was through, Loki could already smell it. He wrinkled his nose.

“How much did you drink already?” he asked, setting the pizza’s down in the kitchen. When he turned around, Tony was already holding a bottle up to his lips, a guilty expression on his face. He lowered it, the golden-brown liquid inside sloshing. There was maybe two-thirds left.

“Some. A bit. Why does it even matter?” in defiance he raised the bottle again, taking a swig.

“It doesn’t. It’s your business what you do or don’t poison yourself with.” Now that he was inside, he could get a proper look at Tony – and he was a mess. Loki frowned as Stark paced around the kitchen. His hair was more dishevelled than usual, his face pale and the dark circles under his eyes gave him an almost haunted look. He couldn’t seem to settle his attention on any one thing, including Loki himself, and his clothes looked as if they’d been slept in multiple times. Loki let him pace a few more moments, then grabbed his arm and pointed at the pizza.

“Stark. Eat.”

"Oh. Sure. Right. Okay."

In an obscenely small amount of time Tony had scarfed down half a pizza, but once he was done he seemed much calmer. At least, Loki thought, he wasn’t clinging to that bottle of whisky any more. He subtly nudged it a little further along the counter from where Tony had left it, so it was partly hidden behind a box of cereal. Tony didn’t seem to notice.

“Okay. Here’s your pizza money,” he said when he could speak again. He dug in his pocket and handed Loki an envelope. “I have the favour money but…I don’t know if you want to do it. The favour. I mean. You bring me food all the time but I don’t know if you- if we’re…” he trailed off, rubbing his fingers through his hair.

“Whatever it is, Stark, just spit it out. You’re making me twitchy.”

Tony shoved another slice of pizza into his mouth – as good a method of stalling as any, Loki thought – and avoided eye contact. Loki crossed his arms, cocked an eyebrow, and waited. After Tony had finished, he said, haltingly,

“Are we…friends…Loki?”

Loki stared at him. Well, that one had come straight out of nowhere-at-fucking-all.

“I…suppose so,” he answered. “We have spent some time together – certainly more than acquaintances would. And we have known each other for almost two years now.”

“Known each other. You’ve known _of_ me,” Tony said. His hands twined and untwined themselves together, fingers picking at each other. “We have other friends in common, but we only really started talking when I started harassing you to bring me food, and I don’t know if a few months of you being the best damn takeout I ever had counts as friendship, you know?”

“Stark, when was the last time you slept?”

Tony ignored him and kept talking.

“It’s just. I couldn’t think of anyone else I could talk to about this. That I _wanted_ to talk to about this. No-one I could think of who might get it. And hell, I don’t know why I thought you would but I just.” His hands gripped each other, a sudden death grab at his own wrists, enough to turn his knuckles white. “I could just see them all _trying_ , you know? I went through every conversation in my mind and I could see them all _trying_ to understand. _Trying_ to get it. To be good friends.” He looked up at Loki, his eyes more desperate than Loki had ever seen anyone look. “And it would be _awful_.”

“What the hell is wrong, Stark?” Loki said. He gazed at the frantic man across from him. “Are you dying or something? Did you invent a lethal virus that you unleashed on the world and now you have three days to stop it before it wipes out humanity? Did you finally make a true AI and let it loose on the internet and now we’re mere hours away from the total shutdown of civilisation as we know it?”

Tony snorted in laughter and his hands relaxed at last. A strange kind of relief flooded through Loki, and he suddenly realised he’d been holding himself almost as tense as Tony had been. Stark was shaking his head, still chuckling.

“Oh, Jesus, no. No! My life is not a Michael Crichton novel, Loki. Christ. Nothing so awful.”

“Then just spit it out, pay me like some cheap emotional prostitute and finish your damned pizza."

“Alright. Alright.” Tony said. Then, “Will you come help me finish it? You don’t have to do me the favour, I swear, just. Sit?”

Loki wanted to say no – he didn’t really like pizza, and this whole thing was getting awkward and weird and slightly scary, and he still had so much work to do and…

And Tony was staring at him like he was drowning and Loki was the only boat for miles around. So he did the only thing he could do – he picked up the pizza boxes and carried them through to Tony’s living room, and sat with him on the sofa to eat them. Tony ate half a slice, then fiddled with his phone while Loki ate a piece of his own. Music started to pour quietly from some hidden speakers, and Loki cocked his head to one side, half-recognising it.

" _Muse_. You like _Muse_? Don’t like _Muse?_ I can change it." Tony started swiping at his phone. Shaking his head, Loki reached out and plucked the device from his hands.

"Stark. Tony. If you don't say what's wrong, I can't do you that favour you want. So talk."

Tony swallowed and wiped his hands on his jeans. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, and he stared down at his knees rather than look up at Loki.

"I've been. Doing a lot of thinking lately. Not even about my projects, which is weird, because usually that's all I think about. And this is your last chance to back out, because the favour is I want to tell you about this, and then you agree to never tell anyone else, okay?”

"Okay," Loki said. He was braced for whatever dark secret it was that Stark had. He was no stranger to discovering painful truths about oneself - the memory of finding his own adoption records in his father’s study still burned bright and sharp. It certainly made family dinners more awkward than they used to be, and whatever Stark had to say could hardly be worse than that unless there was some kind of homicide involved.

"IthinkI'masexualandI'mgonnadiealoneandnoonegetsitandPepperbrokeupwithme."

Loki sat frozen for a moment, trying to decipher the string of sounds that had just come out of Tony’s mouth.

"Try that again, with punctuation."

Stark’s hands clenched into fists on top of his thighs, as if saying it again was as hard as one of his programming exams.

"I think I'm asexual. And I'm going to be alone forever. Because no-one will get it. And Pepper broke up with me last week because of it."

Loki stared at him for a long moment, sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Stark-” he began. Tony stood up suddenly.

“I should have known! I never should have told you. God, I’m so stupid, this was such an awful idea. I shouldn’t have said anything, I’m sorry, I-“

“It wasn’t an awful idea,” Loki caught his arm and yanked him back down onto the sofa. “And you’re not stupid. I just…I thought you were going to tell me some great, dark secret of huge important, and you’re just having a sexuality crisis.”

“My sexuality crisis is a great, dark secret of huge importance! Loki! Pepper hates me! I’m going to be alone forever and you know that can’t happen!” he turned, grabbing Loki’s shoulders. “I need people! I’m too incredible to be ignored!”

Loki stifled a laugh and put his hands over Tony’s, lifting them away before they could bruise him.

“Your ego aside, Stark, how do you know that you being asexual is why Pepper broke up with you? Maybe she just got tired of your terrible hygiene standards.”

“No! It’s because…because…because…” Tony’s voice hitched. He shut his eyes, trying to breathe deeply. Eyes still closed, he continued; “Because she hated that we never. You know. Had sex a lot. There was some yelling. A lot of yelling, actually, spaced over several weeks. Long, drawn out yelling. I might have broken her shoes – the expensive ones, the ones she talks about and you can _hear_ the capital ‘S’. She nearly broke my ribs. She thinks it’s her – it’s not her. Wasn’t her. I’m just fucked.”

He flopped down across the length of the sofa then, draping his entire torso over Loki’s knees like an oversized cat. Even stretched out fully horizontal his feet still didn’t reach the other arm of the sofa – a fact that made an oddly entertaining warmth spark in Loki’s chest. Loki flicked him in the side of the head.

"You should have just told her what you're telling me, idiot. She'd understand."

"No she wouldn't," Tony moaned. "She likes it. Sex, that is. She wants – wanted – it. On a regular basis, not just for like, anniversaries and Valentine’s and birthdays. You know, special occasions."

"And you don't want it apart from those times?"

“Not really. When we  - when you get going with it, it’s fun! Sort of. But I never looked at her the way she looked at me, the way I saw her looking at me. It just. Never occurred to me. To do that.”

“What, to look at someone like you want to fuck them?”

Tony made a startled choking sound.

"What?"

"You swore!" He sat up, starting to grin. "Oh my god, I've never heard you do that!" Loki rolled his eyes.

"What are you talking about? I swear all the time."

"Only in text! You've never done it out loud before! Oh, man, I wish I had a recording of that, that's a historic moment."

"Stark. Please. You were having a crisis?"

"Oh. Right." His grin faded and he stared up at the ceiling. Loki regretting bringing him down like that, and was surprised at himself.

“That’s basically it,” Tony was saying. “I’m going to die along and unloved and I can’t do a thing about it. I can’t make myself do it. You know me, I have zero willpower, I am entirely driven by impulse. That’s why I’m so good at making things.”

“It’s also why you’re probably due a heart attack at twenty-five,” Loki quipped. Tony laughed, and there was that stab of happiness in Loki’s chest again. But Tony was twisting his hands together again, lacing and unlacing his fingers together in frantic little motions. Loki reached down and put a hand over Tony’s, halting their movement.

 “Calm down,” he said. “You won’t be alone forever.”

“What, like anyone’s going to date me now? A loser mechanic who’s more interested in building robots in his basement than sleeping with anyone?” he snorted. “Yeah, right. Even with my admittedly stellar good looks, who would go for someone like that?”

“I might.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop himself from saying them. Loki instantly wanted to bite them back in, cram then down his throat before Tony could hear them, could understand what he was saying.

Tony sat up, his face now uncomfortably close to Loki’s own.

“Really?”

Loki wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting – disgust, maybe. Anger. But all Tony sounded was confused.

“Well. I mean,” Loki coughed, the ceiling suddenly very interesting. “All what you’re going through is exactly the same as what I went through. So…I can relate.”

He could feel Tony’s eyes burning into him but continued to examine the stipple pattern in the ceiling.

“You _what_?”

“I had exactly the same crisis as you. Except that I didn’t text my personal delivery service to come and listen to me wail about it. I just did it on my own.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Tony grabbed Loki’s face and pulled it down so Loki had to look at him. “Is this you realising you were gay or- or- or…”

“Ace,” Loki supplied, his voice soft. He could feel Tony’s rapid breath on his face, the heat of his fingers pressing into his jaw. It almost hurt, but not quite. “Exactly the same.”

“You’re….you’re really ace too?” Tony kept on _staring_ at him, and it was making Loki decidedly uncomfortable.

“Yes. Why are you surprised? In all the time you’ve known me, have I ever given the impression of being remotely interesting in sex?”

“I just thought that was…you know… _you_ ,” Tony waved a hand. “You’re an art student, you’re all supposed to be aloof and mysterious. Like god. Or a cat.”

Loki raised an eyebrow.

“Thank you for the comparison.”

Tony said nothing, just kept looking at him. Loki’s heart was beginning to speed up in his chest and not for the first time in his life he wished that he weren’t so pale – the slightest flush was impossible not to notice on his face. He was very aware in that moment that Tony was now sitting on his lap, his hands still gripping Loki’s face.

What was this turning into?

Tony swallowed and relaxed his grip on Loki’s face, sliding his hand a little more gently along Loki’s jaw. Loki bit the inside of his lip.

“I,” he said, his voice cracking over a dry throat, “Can I kiss you right now? Is that something you…like?”

Tony’s eyes widened and he nodded. Loki raised his own hands, sliding his fingers into the mess of Tony’s hair. It wasn’t the world’s best kiss – it tasted of pizza, and was a little too wet for Loki’s liking – but when he pulled away Tony was smiling so wide it seemed that his face would split in half.

“Loki,” he said.

"Mm-hmm?" Loki found that he wanted Tony’s mouth back on his again. Just to feel what it was like again.

"You wanna do that dating thing?"

"That depends," Loki said. Tony’s face fell.

“On what?”

Loki snaked his arms around Tony’s waist and pulled him closer.

“On if you’re going to keep paying me for bringing you food. Because in the context of a relationship - however lacking in sexual nature – that might begin to get strange.”

Tony laughed and Loki had never felt more certain that he’d made the correct decision.

“Babe, you date me, and I’ll buy _you_ food whenever you want. Scouts honour.”

“You were never a Scout,” Loki murmured. He leaned forwards and kissed Tony again, softer than the first time. It was an oddly relieving feeling to be kissing someone he knew for certain wasn’t going to expect anything else to follow it.  He could, as a matter of fact, get used to it.

“So. The dating thing it is then?” Tony asked when they broke apart. Loki nodded.

“The dating thing it is.”

\-----------

_bzzz_

_bzzz_

_bzzz_

_-Hey babe bring me a milkshake and like four packets of oreos?_

_-$$$$_

_-and also robotics?_

\---

_-one packet of oreos and an apple_

_-no money required_

_-AND DEFINITELY NO ROBOTICS THE LAST ONE NEARLY BURNT MY FLAT DOWN_

_\---_

_bzzz_

\---

_- <3_

_\---_

_-...._

_- <3_

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Thank you for reading. This fic was mostly me working some things out, and then I put jokes in it because I can’t help what I am, okay.


End file.
